Defence force plagued by drug problems sacks 65

The Australian navy and state police forces are involved in seven joint investigations into illicit drug use by sailors, including one at Victoria's largest naval base, HMAS Cerberus, amid growing concerns about drug problems in the Australian Defence Force.

Three searches for drugs have been carried out since September at Cerberus, which, according to the Royal Australian Navy, now accounts for half the detected drug offences in the service.

The current probe at the base is the fifth joint investigation between the navy and Victoria Police since May 2002 into illegal drugs.

Disclosure of the latest joint operations, given to a Senate inquiry by the navy last week, coincides with concerns raised by a senior naval officer that its internal crime investigation unit is poorly trained, understaffed and forced to use outdated equipment.

Lieutenant-Commander Brian Sankey said in a submission to a federal parliamentary inquiry into military justice that the Naval Investigative Service was "short-staffed" and "overworked", relied on unqualified or inexperienced investigators and had an operating budget of just $100,000 to pay for investigations within Australia and overseas as well as buying specialist equipment.

It has also been revealed that:

More than 165 members of the Australian Defence Force have been found using illegal drugs, with 65 so far discharged and more expected to follow.

The navy has run 12 joint drug operations with Australian Customs in the past two years, mostly involving the use of sniffer dogs to search warships returning from active duty.

A Royal Australian Air Force whistleblower, who revealed the use of illegal drugs in the airforce's elite Airfield Defence Wing at Amberley, Queensland, has been moved at least five times because of fears for his life.

Army investigators and police have still not traced two automatic rifles and two pistols that went missing from the Robertson Army base in Darwin last year.

The army, navy and air force have started phasing in random drug testing that will eventually see one in 10 service-members checked each year in the face of growing evidence of drug abuse in the military.

Chief of the Navy Vice-Admiral Chris Ritchie told a hearing of the Senate's Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade committee last week that 30 allegations of illegal drug use in the navy in 2003 had resulted in six convictions under the Defence Force Discipline Act and three convictions under civil law. Nine members had been discharged and a further seven were in the process of being terminated.

According to figures provided to an earlier Senate hearing, half the 60 illicit drug cases in the navy since May 2002 had occurred at HMAS Cerberus. Investigations had led to 31 sailors being discharged.

Admiral Ritchie said he was reluctant to provide further details about the current investigation at Cerberus until it was complete. "I would not like to talk about the extent of what might happen at Cerberus," he said.

A Defence Force spokesman told The Sunday Age that the first random drug tests at HMAS Cerberus on the Mornington Peninsula were carried out on February 12. The results are still pending.

The army has uncovered illicit drug use at bases in Darwin in the Northern Territory, Townsville in Queensland and Woodside in South Australia, according to the Chief of the Army, Lieutenant-General Peter Leahy. Forty-seven soldiers had tested positive in Darwin, with 24 so far discharged. A further 15 had tested positive in Townsville and seven at Woodside, with action against those involved still pending.

General Leahy said a further 10 soldiers had been tested "in the last few days" with three positive results.

He said there was no evidence to suggest that the disappearance of two Steyr automatic rifles and two nine-millimetre pistols from Darwin's Robertson Barracks last year was linked to organised crime or drug rings. He said it appeared that one of the pistols had been lost on a training exercise.

"As to the others (weapons), we are working with our investigators and civil investigators, but we do not seem to be able to find them," General Leahy said.